About this Research Topic
In 2015, all United Nation Member States adopted an agenda “Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”, a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet. The agenda involves “Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)” that consists of 17 missions including good health and wellbeing, no poverty or hunger, water and food security, clean energy, marine resource development and economic growth as a compass for aligning efforts to achieve sustainable development in human society.
The extremely high growth rate of microalgae has been receiving considerable attention as the premise of novel technologies to solve the global food and energy crisis. Owing to the ability of microalgae to perform carbon dioxide fixation and nutrient uptake from wastewater, they also hold great promise as contributors to the mitigation of global warming and wastewater treatment. Furthermore, various high-value lipids and pigments such as eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), b-carotene, astaxanthin, fucoxanthin and others can be found highly concentrated in microalgae biomass, potentially serving as a strong basis for achieving SDGs in the categories of human health, food and water securities, poverty and economic development.
Although advances have been made over recent decades, commercialization of microalgae biomass, especially high-value species, remains a formidable challenge primarily due to techno-economic constraints including the cost of photo-bioreactors, the huge energy expenditure for mixing culture media and harvesting, the contamination risks and the supply of nutrient sources. Although microalgae markets of high value-added products for nutraceutical and cosmetic industries are steadily growing, with the global market expected to reach 3,790 million USD by 2024, biomass and pigment production cannot meet this demand. If production technologies for yielding several high value-added biocompounds are established, microalgae biomass can be utilized as an exclusive bioresource for nutraceutical, pharmaceutical and cosmeceutical industries. By advancing and expanding technological advancements towards low cost and energy efficient production of microalgae, it is hoped that this will have positive implications, not only for human health, but also for food security, water pollution, energy issue and other environmental issues highlighted in the SDGs.
In order to expand the utilization of microalgae biomass, it is necessary to propagate research efforts in two directions: (1) from the engineering perspective for energy and cost saving of production process, and (2) from the biotechnological perspective for finding new functional properties of microalgae. In this Research Topic, we welcome the submission of all article types related to microalgae production, with a preference for Original Research, Reviews, and Opinions, focusing on the following:
- Studies on new processes for low cost and energy production.
- High cell density culture and continuous culture for effective production of microalgae.
- EPA, DHA and other high value-added lipid production.
- B-carotene, astaxanthin, fucoxanthin and other carotenoids pigments production.
- Novel harvesting technologies, including sedimentation, concentration and drying methods.
- Microalgae utilization for aquaculture and livestock industries.
- Microalgae utilization for developing countries including low cost culture methods, food security and pollution control.
The extremely high growth rate of microalgae has been receiving considerable attention as the premise of novel technologies to solve the global food and energy crisis. Owing to the ability of microalgae to perform carbon dioxide fixation and nutrient uptake from wastewater, they also hold great promise as contributors to the mitigation of global warming and wastewater treatment. Furthermore, various high-value lipids and pigments such as eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), b-carotene, astaxanthin, fucoxanthin and others can be found highly concentrated in microalgae biomass, potentially serving as a strong basis for achieving SDGs in the categories of human health, food and water securities, poverty and economic development.
Although advances have been made over recent decades, commercialization of microalgae biomass, especially high-value species, remains a formidable challenge primarily due to techno-economic constraints including the cost of photo-bioreactors, the huge energy expenditure for mixing culture media and harvesting, the contamination risks and the supply of nutrient sources. Although microalgae markets of high value-added products for nutraceutical and cosmetic industries are steadily growing, with the global market expected to reach 3,790 million USD by 2024, biomass and pigment production cannot meet this demand. If production technologies for yielding several high value-added biocompounds are established, microalgae biomass can be utilized as an exclusive bioresource for nutraceutical, pharmaceutical and cosmeceutical industries. By advancing and expanding technological advancements towards low cost and energy efficient production of microalgae, it is hoped that this will have positive implications, not only for human health, but also for food security, water pollution, energy issue and other environmental issues highlighted in the SDGs.
In order to expand the utilization of microalgae biomass, it is necessary to propagate research efforts in two directions: (1) from the engineering perspective for energy and cost saving of production process, and (2) from the biotechnological perspective for finding new functional properties of microalgae. In this Research Topic, we welcome the submission of all article types related to microalgae production, with a preference for Original Research, Reviews, and Opinions, focusing on the following:
- Studies on new processes for low cost and energy production.
- High cell density culture and continuous culture for effective production of microalgae.
- EPA, DHA and other high value-added lipid production.
- B-carotene, astaxanthin, fucoxanthin and other carotenoids pigments production.
- Novel harvesting technologies, including sedimentation, concentration and drying methods.
- Microalgae utilization for aquaculture and livestock industries.
- Microalgae utilization for developing countries including low cost culture methods, food security and pollution control.
Keywords: Microalgae production, Aquaculture, Wastewater treatment, Carotenoid pigment, SDGs
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